Guess You Had to be There: Kanye’s Bowery Ballroom Rant Full of Contradictions, Nonsense, Platitudes and Childish Bragging

If you can believe it, lots of people in attendance at Kanye West’s record-release show at Bowery Ballroom last night were on Twitter, making it really easy and infuriating to follow along at home. Toward the end of the show, everyone was giddy about this ten-minute speech he delivered right before wrapping up. And sure, I get it: It must have been cool to watch a sort of crazy guy yell and scream about the things that make him craziest, but in terms of the rant’s actual content? It’s really just more of the same shit about how he’s constantly being mistreated, and then overcoming that mistreatment because he’s awesome and because of the energy from models or whatever. I briefly considered the possibility that the whole thing was redeemed by the bit near the end when he says, “If you a real artist, have no fear. Say what the fuck you want, do what you want, make what you want,” because, you know, sure! But then again, removed from the energy of the room, I’m not sure how loudly I can clap for something that sounds like it got cut from the script of Pump Up the Volume. Also, If you listen really closely at around 7:15, you’ll hear one person say, “Who cares, Kanye?” [Awl]